You had me at Hello

Morning of...

After a sleep of 7 hours and a mosquito hovering around me, I finally couldn't sleep past 6am. The day ahead wanted to get started and I was ready for it to start!

Your Nani mama (my mom) was on Skype at 8:30am waiting to see if we were all set and ready to go. I am wearing my special T for you today. I got it especially for this day. Nani mama reminded me to collect my thoughts and go to a calm place and do paath (Sikh prayers) before leaving. So, now, resounding in the apartment are soothing sounds of the 1st pauri of Japji Sahib, the paath that your Nani mama always taught us to do when stressed, before a big day, in any special moment etc. Your daddy also enjoys Japji Sahib and we both teared up (Silly us Cancerians, I know) while the "Ek Omkar Satnam" played in our home here, our minds and in our hearts.

Sending you all its positive vibes and look forward to holding you in our arms, little one. It has been a looooong time coming. Its 9:45am now and we're waiting to hear from Saltanat or Tatiana about what time they will be here to get us. Everyone waits with baited breath to hear all about today. Everyone sends you their love and prayers. You are surrounded by good wishes and love, sweetheart. Mama & Papa are on their way.

The day before the BIG DAY!

After endless delays, late flights, busy administrators, etc etc it is finally time. The time to meet you, little one. Our little Daragoi. Our little darling.

To say I have butterflies in my stomach would be an understatement. All this past week I have been a bit unwell, taking antibiotics since catching some bug on Wednesday. Many of my close family & friends have repeatedly said that things will happen when they should and I too have believed there is a reason for any and all delays. All part of a greater plan and all that.

This delay on Friday too, because of which we couldn't meet our little guy on Friday itself seems to have been for good reason too. (First our flight from Almaty to Aktobe was delayed by about 2 hours and then the rep from the Ministry of Education was busy in meetings all evening so couldn't be present at the all important first meeting at the Baby House.) However, this gave us time to catch up on some much needed rest, deal with the jet lag a bit (though I'm way too excited to sleep more than 3-4 hrs straight) and most importantly it gave me time to recover and complete my antibiotics course and get better.

Tomorrow (about 10 hrs from now-anytime after 9am), we will all go to the BH, and after some official procedures they will bring you in to meet us. That moment, the moment you walk into the room, the way you look at us, what you say, how you react, how we control ourselves from wrapping you in our arms as tight as we can, all that is something that we will play in our memory bank millions of times, for the rest of our lives.
I wonder if we will be able to record it on a camera somehow, because I truly just want to be in the moment and let someone else take care of the recording part, but then we don't know if Saltanat can do that for us.

It is 10:45pm now and I really should get to bed. I hope sleep comes easy for once, for I want the night to pass quickly and the morning that holds so much importance for us...that morning can't come fast enough.

The 4 of us, Koko, John, Deepak & me toasted to you and Beks today, to our new lives, to the new dawn of a new us with a great meal of Chicken Curry that your daddy prepared for the 4 of us. Here's to you, sweetheart, my little Sladinchik, moi Daragoi. We cannot wait to see you. Sleep tight sweetheart. Sleep tight.

Past 48 hours: Facebook Updates & Pics

Wednesday evening-Paka Ottawa! Next update should be from Frankfurt.

Thursday evening - Privet Kazakhstan! — with Almaty International Airport.

Friday Morning - Reporting from the hostel style airport hotel in Almaty: over 24 hrs since we left home. Great movies on AC and Lufthansa till Almaty! Landed n felt like we were in Delhi! Cabbies n touts galore thankfully Dee speaks fluent Russian! Chkd into Akunsar at the airport for a 8 hr layover. The cacophony of noise with stray dogs barking all night, cars honking away... Feels just like Delhi :) the Tien Shan snow capped mountains look gorgeous this morning! No sleep for me though Dee got quite a bit of sleep. Dee knowing the language is making things so much easier! Now getting ready to catch the flight to Aktobe! Having 10 meds to speed up getting better. In pain, sleep deprived but super excited to see what the day brings. Will v see him today or not... That is the million $ Qs. — at Almaty International Airport.

Pic: Morning views of the Tien Shan in Almaty —

Friday morning in Almaty - This dawn after yesterday's full moon night, a little child will wake in Aktobe not knowing he just got up from his last sleep without a family. For today is the first day of the rest of our wonderful lives together. The first day he will meet his parents and we will meet our child. It's 'delivery' time! (even if there's still some time to spend at the 'hospital' before baby ji comes home) 

Friday afternoon in Aktobe - So. We are finally in Aktobe!!! Flight was delayed 2 hrs which meant the rep from Ministry of Education wasn't free this late afternoon as we arrived at 2pm to a rainy n slightly chilly Aktyubinsk. (Reminds me a bit of Aurangabad here) so we can't see him till Monday morning. :( That meeting will be about a 15 min meeting so as to not shock him too much, followed by the official start of the bonding process on Tuesday for a daily single visit of 2 hrs. From Thursday we will do the twice a day visit of 2 hrs each (hopefully). We knew it was a risk coming in on Friday, but we also knew it was a risk we wanted to take, for any chance of meeting him as soon as we could was worth it in our books. I will now update the blog too. Whew! What a crazy 38 hrs it has been. Wow! Now let's set up our soviet era apartment for our month+ long stay (its pretty large and not bad at all I must say. Infact its quite nice!  

Friday evening in Aktobe -Ok, so Lays has crab flavored chips, caviar chips etc etc. Stocked up our pantry and kitchen from this HUGE grocery store. Think Costco & T&T with a lot more variety and no GMF. Of course no English on many of the items, unless they were the American brands (Nestle, L'Oreal etc etc), so again was glad to have Dee translating. Aisles and aisles of just types of Mayo and milk and other dairy products too. And women really love their heels here-nothing less than a 6 inch heel-yup even if you're grocery shopping. 

 

Pls respect the info shared in this blog and not make it harder for us than it is

Just wanted to write a note to any agencies or other people further along in this process at the same time as us, but are not yet traveling. The reason I keep making the blog public most of the time is so that anyone considering this very stressful but totally 'worth it' process can get a good idea of the steps and with us being one of the first families to be going into Kaz after the new rules, we hope it can help alleviate some of the unknowns as we learn the new things and the hurdles along the way.

That being said, please respect that this has not been a 'quick' journey by any means. The delays have been many, esp in Kazakhstan with paperwork, documents and other things needed. It has been 11 months now since we officially started this process, so by no means is it within 5-6 months that we are at this stage. What I know I mostly share, otherwise somethings need to be private as we have been advised so for now will stay that way. Other agencies making things harder for us by questioning how we got this and why we got this etc etc, it makes it harder for us, and makes us consider if we are making a mistake sharing this information with everyone, especially the families currently in the process. The first priority for us will always be to make sure our family is safe and our own process is not jeopardized. Understandably, only after that comes our willingness to help anyone on the same journey & we will help any way allowed and possible for sure. If you or your agency is going to create problems for us, intentionally or unintentionally I am afraid I will have to become a mama bear and protect 'Me and Mine' first. :)

I might make the blog private because of this, till we are back and allow access to those I know are genuinely following us without malice or any such intent.
Also, this blog is for families in the process, fellow Adoptive Parents following our journey and supporting us through it, friends and family. It is NOT for Agencies...at this point. Perhaps later they may be privy to the same.

I hope you can appreciate and understand our concerns and respect our request.

Visa is ready for pick up! We truly are leaving in 2 days!

We are packed, money belt is in, Nikki (our sweetheart doggie) has been handed over to Johanne & Jacques till we return.

We are all set to leave on Wednesday-an extra special day as its my dad's birthday on 24th April as well. One we will now always remember as being doubly special. We will be flying from Ottawa directly to Frankfurt and then directly to Almaty in Kazakhstan. We arrive there at midnight on Thursday so will walk to the small airport hostel/hotel and try and get some sleep for our 10 hr break journey. Our flight from Almaty to Aktobe is on Air Astana on Friday morning so by noon on Friday we will be in the city that will become extra special to us, and another place we would have 'lived' in.

Thank you to all those who have been following our journey, praying for us, cheering us on, crying with us through the delays thus far and yet reminding us to keep our eyes on what's to come-our baby. It has been frustrating and a long ride till now...but it will be all worth it.
This blog is now public-so you dont need an invitation - till we are in Court and I'll make it private just for a few days at that time for safety reasons.

We Are Ready.

Take 2. LOI Recvd, Approved, Tickets booked! Again. ;)

Woohoo! So after a daily wait and waking up early morning (8am is early for me!) to refresh my Hotmail account just to see if there's any news on the LOI and approval etc, the news we've been waiting for is finally here!

Thank God for * at the Consulate in Ottawa and Liana, our stoic warrior rep here in Canada. He has been very helpful and kind through this whole mess. He has assured L that we will have our visas on Tuesday, 23rd April, after so many weeks of delay.

Yippee doodeedoo! Just booked our flights! We're outta here on Wednesday, 24th of April, in just 5 days!
Flying to Aktobe on the Friday, 26th April. So maybe we can even be meeting the little one on Friday afternoon itself. Let's see. For now.....WE PACK!

Awesome article by an Adoptive Mom. Things to share with those around you.

http://jenhatmaker.com/blog/2011/11/02/how-to-be-the-village#.UVox6AAHiYR.facebook

Was sent this awesome article by Kristin Luippold, mommy-in-waiting in the US, an article that voices 99% of what I want to say too. Iffy on the 2nd point 'After the Airport', but the rest of it is pretty spot on at least this far in our journey, where we are, and as I can envision soon after we are home too. Here is some of Jen Hatmaker's article which holds true to where we are in the process right now-for the rest pls click on the link above.

"Let’s break this down into two categories:

Supporting Families Before the Airport

Your friends are adopting. They’re in the middle of dossiers and home studies, and most of them are somewhere in the middle of Waiting Purgatory. Please let me explain something about WP: It sucks in every way. Oh sure, we try to make it sound better than it feels by using phrases like “We’re trusting in God’s plan” and “God is refining me” and “Sovereignty trumps my feelings” and crazy bidness like that. But we are crying and aching and getting angry and going bonkers when you’re not watching. It’s hard. It hurts. It feels like an eternity even though you can see that it is not. It is harder for us to see that, because many of us have pictures on our refrigerators of these beautiful darlings stuck in an orphanage somewhere while we’re bogged down in bureaucracy and delays.

How can you help? By not saying or doing these things:

1. “God’s timing is perfect!” (Could also insert: “This is all God’s plan!” “God is in charge!”) As exactly true as this may be, when you say it to a waiting parent, we want to scratch your eyebrows off and make you eat them with a spoon. Any trite answer that minimizes the struggle is as welcomed as a sack of dirty diapers. You are voicing something we probably already believe while not acknowledging that we are hurting and that somewhere a child is going to bed without a mother again. Please never say this again. Thank you.

2. “Are you going to have your own kids?” (Also in this category: “You’ll probably get pregnant the minute your adoption clears!” “Since this is so hard, why don’t you just try to have your own kids?” “Well, at least you have your own kids.”) The subtle message here is: You can always have legitimate biological kids if this thing tanks. It places adoption in the Back-up Plan Category, where it does not belong for us. When we flew to Ethiopia with our first travel group from our agency, out of 8 couples, we were the only parents with biological kids. The other 7 couples chose adoption first. Several of them were on birth control. Adoption counts as real parenting, and if you believe stuff Jesus said, it might even be closer to the heart of God than regular old procreation. (Not to mention the couples that grieved through infertility already. So when you say, “Are you going to have your own kids?” to a woman who tried for eight years, then don’t be surprised if she pulls your beating heart out like Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom.)

3. For those of you in Christian community, it is extremely frustrating to hear: “Don’t give up on God!” or “Don’t lose faith!” It implies that we are one nanosecond away from tossing our entire belief system in the compost pile because we are acting sad or discouraged. It’s condescending and misses the crux of our emotions. I can assure you, at no point in our story did we think about kicking Jesus to the curb, but we still get to cry tears and feel our feelings, folks. Jesus did. And I’m pretty sure he went to heaven when he died.

4. We’re happy to field your questions about becoming a transracial family or adopting a child of another race, but please don’t use this moment to trot out your bigotry. (Cluelessness is a different thing, and we try to shrug that off. Like when someone asked about our Ethiopian kids, “Will they be black?” Aw, sweet little dum-dum.) The most hurtful thing we heard during our wait was from a black pastor who said, “Whatever you do, don’t change their last name to Hatmaker, because they are NOT Hatmakers. They’ll never be Hatmakers. They are African.” What the??? I wonder if he’d launch the same grenade if we adopted white kids from Russia? If you’d like to know what we’re learning about raising children of another race or ask respectful, legitimate questions, by all means, do so. We care about this and take it seriously, and we realize we will traverse racial landmines with our family. You don’t need to point out that we are adopting black kids and we are, in fact, white. We’ve actually already thought of that.

5. Saying nothing is the opposite bad. I realize with blogs like this one, you can get skittish on how to talk to a crazed adopting Mama without getting under her paper-thin skin or inadvertently offending her. I get it. (We try hard not to act so hypersensitive. Just imagine that we are paper-pregnant with similar hormones surging through our bodies making us cry at Subaru commercials just like the 7-month preggo sitting next to us. And look at all this weight we’ve gained. See?) But acting like we’re not adopting or struggling or waiting or hoping or grieving is not helpful either. If I was pregnant with a baby in my belly, and no one ever asked how I was feeling or how much longer or is his nursery ready or can we plan a shower, I would have to audition new friend candidates immediately.

Here’s what we would love to hear Before the Airport:

1. Just kind, normal words of encouragement. Not the kind that assume we are one breath away from atheism. Not the kind that attempt to minimize the difficulties and tidy it all up with catchphrases. We don’t actually need for you to fix our wait. We just want you to be our friend and acknowledge that the process is hard and you care about us while we’re hurting. That is GOLD. I was once having lunch with my friend Lynde when AWAA called with more bad news about Ben’s case, and I laid my head down on the table in the middle of Galaxy Café and bawled. Having no idea what to do with such a hot mess, she just cried with me. Thank you for being perfect that day, Lynde.

2. Your questions are welcomed! We don’t mind telling you about the court system in Ethiopia or the in-country requirements in Nicaragua or the rules of the foster system. We’re glad to talk about adoption, and we’re thankful you care. I assure you we didn’t enter adoption lightly, so sharing details of this HUGE PIECE OF OUR LIVES is cathartic. Plus, we want you to know more because we’re all secretly hoping you’ll adopt later. (This is not true.) (Yes it is.)

3. When you say you’re praying for us and our waiting children, and you actually really are, not only does that soothe our troubled souls, but according to Scripture, it activates the heavens. So pray on, dear friends. Pray on. That is always the right thing to say. And please actually do it. We need people to stand in the gap for us when we are too tired and discouraged to keep praying the same words another day.

4. If you can, please become telepathic to determine which days we want to talk about adoption and which days we’d rather you just show up on our doorstep with fresh figs from the Farmer’s Market (thanks, Katie) or kidnap us away in the middle of the day to go see Bridesmaids. Sometimes we need you to make us laugh and remember what it feels like to be carefree for a few hours. If you’re not sure which day we’re having, just pre-buy movie tickets and show up with the figs, and when we answer the door, hold them all up and ask, “Would you like to talk for an hour uninterrupted about waiting for a court date?” We’ll respond to whichever one fits."

Difficult week. Cancelling our flights for tomorrow :( Hold on lil one, Mommy & Daddy are coming soon.

This was a very emotional and difficult week. With everyday bringing news of delays and how the M Of Education was giving T and V a hard time, not fixing their errors on the LOI.
L tried all her contacts from Russia to Kaz, to try and get them to fix what they themselves had messed up but then Wednesday was closed to the public. So, eventually we heard that they did sign off on a table on Thursday and V took it to the MEA, who would hopefully sign it and update it on the system. The consul here in Ottawa was being very kind and helpful and answering Liana's calls and keeping her updated too. However, it is still not updated on their system, I believe we have a new LOI no. but they have not changed the LOI dates which is ridiculous, knowing that we would have lost at least half the time mentioned on the letter because of their own fault.
I don't know who they are answerable to, if anyone, and how is it that there are no checks on the paperwork they do, when they do it finally.

Support from all other families who have been through this has been amazing and their tips and suggestions to take this time to do things as a couple, hang in there etc have been helpful. Esp when they share their own stories about all the things that went wrong in their own processes but that finally it was all worth it. This is definitely a lot more difficult than just the physical pain of having a child biologically. The many disappointments, the fears of the unknown, things you cant control that stop you from meeting your child knowing who your child is and that the 'delivery date' has long come and gone... this journey takes a toll on the mind and body-since Im a stress eater.

Wednesday I decided to take Dee out on a nice date at the amazing Le Nordik Spa in Chelsea (Quebec). The Swedish saunas, aromatic saunas, massages, floating salt water pool like the dead sea, hot stone beds, waterfalls and warm pools ending the night with a fabulous 4 course fine dine meal at their restaurant was just what we needed. Of course it cost as much as an all expense trip for 1 to Mexico or Cuba but it was totally worth it and we can at least claim the massages thru our insurance.

Its Friday now and Im in extreme pain for some strange reason over the past 24 hrs. Im sure the stress is taking its toll but the shoulder blade/back pain has been crippling. There is also an ice storm (its supposed to be Spring for crying out loud!) which is quite depressing. But, it will get warmer from tomorrow and we will be going to the Cottage & backyard show to get some ideas for our backyard/front interlocking landscaping.

Heard that our son was ill last week and had the flu. So the baby house is in Quarantine, hopefully he is stronger now and this helped build his immune system, for there are so many changes in his life that are going to happen, esp in the next few months. Stay strong little one, you are a brave little boy and God's gift to us. We are trying everything in our power to meet you soon and bring you home.
We have only seen a picture of you and have loved you since that day, our love for you only growing stronger. Be strong, my little boy, be strong.

No end in sight, flights to be cancelled

Its been a rough Tuesday morning. Have spent hours crying.

Liana and Tanya have been so upset too and Kleenex has been of good use to all of us today. The ministries seem to have archaic systems, cannot just change the mistakes on their system, at the Ministry of Education, apparently. And have to redo it again. Everyone is trying to get this fixed, but we are not very hopeful of a quick resolution. Our reps there are being sent from pillar to post in the interim by the ministries. It seems that the Ministry of External Affairs has promised to do what they can, but since the mistake was done at the Ministry of Education, the asst director and director there need to fix it, sign and send the documents to the MEA again.

Going by their efficiency and how slowly they do things-and now even when they do it, they dont do it correctly, our hopes for seeing our son next week have been dashed.
Aeroplan has been nice and will let us change our tickets-put them on hold without us losing all those points, I was in tears when I spoke to them on the phone today, and they were so kind and helpful.

In all this, we are very glad to have Liana on our side because we know she is going to fight tooth and nail to get things done and contact whoever she can to get them to help fix this mess. I know she is super stressed and upset for us too. We all are, on the same team. Except for who should be with us-the Ministries there. If they really had the best interest of the children at heart, they would do everything in their power to fix things asap and make sure they were with their parents as soon as they could be so that they were part of a family and got the love, care and affection that they so deserve. Help us God, pls.

It is of immense help to me that my new friends made along this adoption journey, other moms who went through all of this awful stuff and more and very supportive and keep writing to me encouraging us to hold on and hang in there.

Still waiting, and crying.

So, it seems that the Ministry of Education messed up when they entered the details electronically.
V was at the Ministry of External Affairs today and was told to come back tomorrow. They are trying to get this done in the next day but now, I have no hope of getting on that much awaited flight to Aktobe, this weekend.

Because of this mess up by them, we will lose more time, not to mention more money in changing all the flights, but worse of all, we will be further delayed in meeting our little one and eventually the domino effect will delay his coming home. I am beyond sad and disheartened.

Of course it was too good to be true.

The LOI was messed up by the Department of Consular Services in Astana, apparently, so now no visa can be issues till they fix the damn letter. I am SOOOOO upset right now. Just when things seemed to be working out, comes this very unnecessary hurdle.

Because T has checked and the info on our side and T's side was given absolutely correctly, L strongly believes that once V goes to the MEA in Astana on Monday morning, they will fix it since they made these mistakes. Hopefully give it to her the same day (I cannot for some reason have faith in their system and quality of work right now). She is working closely with the Embassy here to try and sort this out and they are being very helpful and understanding. If they get teh corrected LOI on Monday they can still process the visas soon enough.

My level of hope and faith is on a low right now.

LOI!

Viktoria has picked up the LOI from the MEA in Astana, which they had left to be signed till the last minute of the promised Friday (today)!

Just recvd the LOI by email, last 1 hr has been spent running like a crazy couple, printing, calling Liana, Dee and her talking in Russian about the Ministry messing up a few small things on the letter. No, I am not Male! And there is another letter infront of our passport nos. AAAArgh! One letter, taken sooooo many weeks to send and still has these mistakes. Really hope the consul can see from all other docs and logic, that the correct info is in all other docs, everywhere else.
Dee has been scrambling to manage his busy work day with all this and now rushing to give the visa apps and request the consul to try and help a bit after this nightmare of a wait, and give the visas as soon as they can.

We should have our visas by Tuesday, if they choose. Looks like we're getting on that awesome flight in 8 days! OMG! OMG! Did I say OMG!? :D

Medicals Updated Finally, after 2.5 weeks of waiting and constant calls.

Whew! Finally Deepak had to go down to see the doctor on her walk-in day, after not getting our medical form for 2.5 weeks. I was panicking now. Thank God! Now, we have the Medical form as well as the Fingerprint Interpol report updated for the second time and off to Liana it is by courier today with yet another money order for the Embassy. Now it gets Notarized, authenticated, legalized and translated again, so that we have updated records for Court. Its Wednesday today, 2 more days and hopefully we will have the LOI number to get our visas.

Even T said she has never experienced such delays at the ministry before, and this was a complete surprise. Good thing is they now know what to expect for the future adoptions from there, and it'll save a month for the next families in line.

10 days and counting...will we, wont we.

Tickets booked!

As per calculations we should have our visa in hand by the middle of next week. So, we just booked our tickets! Its like going on our annual India trip, time wise, so will be fun! and its just one stopover-in Frankfurt. Will stay overnight in Almaty and then go to Aktobe in the morning! Hopefully will meet our little one the same day if possible.

Soooooooo excited!!!! Just hope everything comes in on time. April 13th. T-12!